We’ve been using the same basic stainless steel cookware and bakeware for more than 40 years now. But lately I’ve been looking to replace some of the more beat up pieces. Everything I look at - stainless steel, aluminum, anodized aluminum, whatever, now comes with either an advisory or flat-out warning not to put it in the dishwasher.
We’re not purists. We don’t care of the shiny finish gets a little less shiny over time, and the fact that we’ve been using stainless steel certainly indicates that we don’t put a high priority on a non-stick finish. But I’m not interested in hand washing anything with any less than burnt-on food - THAT’S WHY WE HAVE A DISHWASHER!
Other than cast iron, I’ve never noticed any issue with the dishwasher. I don’t care what they say, I put everything else in the machine. Life’s too short to hand wash.
Everything that fits in the dishwasher goes into it. I even have a bamboo cutting board that goes in there and have been many times and is still totally flat and though a bit more pale, works fine (I don’t oil it either which I suspect would bring back it’s former color).
Occasionally, something will suffer something from this but it’s few and far between. Mostly some discoloration of some plastic like a handle, that does not affect performance.
I suspect it’s a bit like the “hand wash only” label on far too many clothes - if something goes wrong with it they say “did you put it in the dishwasher?” and you admit you did and they say “aah, sorry, no warranty for you!”.
That brownish anodized aluminum finish that happens to be on a lot of my cookware doesn’t fare well at all with dishwashing detergent. Specifically, when I put pans like that in my dishwasher and toss in one of those dishwasher soap packets, everything comes out with light blotches on the outside, permanently changed. I believe it’s something with the alkali in the soap that does it.
Stainless steel goes just fine–under the SS there is more SS, so it’s no issue.
So I don’t put any cookware other than stainless steel in the dishwasher.
I was going to say pretty much exactly that. I’ve got old charcoal gray Calphalon pots that are allergic to the dishwasher - I had one get fatally ruined when the dishwasher detergent corroded the inner surface. Anodized or not, any aluminum will at a minimum be discolored, and at worst, corroded to the point it’s powdery/flaky.
Also, non-stick stuff ages and degrades faster. I don’t even put my $20 skillets from the restaurant supply in the dishwasher.
If it fits it fits. . . inside the dishwasher. If the dishwasher ruins it, then I don’t really want it anyway. Except for when I put the salad spinner inner thingy on the bottom instead of up top and the cheap plastic softened and deformed. So if it is plastic and doesn’t fit up top, it gets hand washed along with the cast iron.
I’ve also noticed that hard anodized cookware came out with discoloration on the outside. And a plain aluminum scoop I was using for rice seemed discolored as well.
I ordered stainless steel, hand-washed it once, then put it to work and in the dishwasher. So far, so good.
@VOW the problem with air drying in your dishwasher is that many of us have had it beaten into us to not run the dishwasher until bedtime, to reduce the load on electrical utilities. The residual heat is gone by morning and the plastic is still wet.
You can get a dishwasher that doesn’t have a drying element. Ours is a Bosch (admittedly a bit spendy) and it works fine.
Interior is stainless steel, which the salesguy said was a big part of how it dries the dishes without that heater. All I know is that the dishes come out as dry as they did in our previous dishwasher that had a heating element, and I don’t have to worry about any “top rack only” limitations.
Some of them you can also turn off the dryer element
I had a conversation with three young women in my office once where I said that Mrs P and I differed over this. I would buy cereal bowls based on whether they would stack efficiently in the dishwasher, and clashed with Mrs P who wanted bowls that were more aesthetically pleasing. Every single one of the three said they agreed with Mrs P!